From humble beginnings, longtime Humble resident Louis Flory always wanted to find ways to give back to charities in his local community, providing a hand-up instead of a handout.

As the Chief Executive Officer of Kingwood-based Effex Management, Flory participated in fundraising golf tournaments and hosted his own tournament to benefit local nonprofit organizations, but knew he could do more.

Flory, along with the help of his girlfriend, Gabrielle Stephens, hosted a first-of-its-kind, The Great Gatsby-themed, fundraising party at Flory's Atascocita area home Saturday night in an effort to raise money for two local nonprofits, Humble Area Assistance Ministries and Mission Northeast.

“I grew up with my grandparents on a farm so I’ve come from welfare to here and now I can make an impact back in my community I grew up in,” Flory said. “My goal is to bring more awareness to what people can do to help our nonprofits but also bring awareness to how they help others in our community. We’ve hosted parties before, but nothing like this.”

Flory kicked off the evening festivities by donating $15,000 to HAAM and $15,000 to Mission Northeast in an effort to encourage others to donate throughout the evening.

“We’re excited to host this party and get everyone together to show them what these charities are about and would love for them to get involved; every dollar does count,” Stephens said.

Flory and Stephens were first introduced to the New Caney-based Mission Northeast during a golf tournament Effex sponsored and most recently volunteered there during the Christmas holidays which allowed for them to have a better idea of what the nonprofit is all about.

Pam Dickson, executive director of Mission Northeast, spoke to guests about what Mission Northeast is focused on and their goal.

“If we are not helping our clients move forward through help with our services then we are not doing what we need to do as a nonprofit,” Dickson said. “I’ve been on mission trips to several third world countries and as great as a community we live in, we have people living in poverty just a few minutes from here.”

Mission Northeast serves approximately 22,000 people a year offering a variety of service from food to job training and job ministry, adult GED classes, a summer learning program for children, childcare and a variety of other services.

Millie Garrison, executive director of HAAM, was also on hand to accept the donation and share a little bit more about what the nonprofit stands for.

“HAAM serves 12 ZIP codes so we cover a lot of ground and has served the community for 26 years,” Garrison said. “The clients we see are those who are homeless, in crisis or the working poor; we are able to help these clients with many resources. On an average year, we provided services for 70,000 clients.”

According to HAAM’s website, HAAM is a faith-based organization that helps community residents in crisis by providing essential resources for clients to move toward self-sufficiency.

“Both of these organizations are doing a great job at something that is very important to me which is giving a hand-up instead of a handout,” Flory said. “We were inspired to do more. We’re also hoping that after this event, our guests will get more involved and volunteer with these local nonprofit organizations.”